"You were my whole galaxy, while I was merely a star in yours."
-unknown
"Look at these, Amy." Her Aunt Sharon was bothering her again. She was fourteen, during this particular conversation. Of course, this conversation has happened many times in the past. Why would it stop now?
"Not now, Aunt Sharon," Amy mutters as she continues to dip her paintbrush in the black paint. She runs out of black paint far too often. With a disdain in her eyes, she throws her aunt a look when her back is turned.
"Amy, please. Honestly, are you painting that thing again?" Her shrill voice is starting to give Amy a headache.
Hints of rebellion present in her voice, Amy replies swiftly, "Yes." She wants to protest that he isn't a thing but how does she know? How much does she really know about Slenderman? She supposes she'll never get her answers now. Each day that passes by only confirms her worst suspicions. He was never going to come back. 'Don't lose hope, Amy', she tells herself daily.
"He's not real, Amy. We've been over this-" Amy starts to tune her out. She wants to kick and scream and shout at her aunt but she won't. She'll only do that to the psychiatrists. Strokes of black paint start to put together the black suit he wears. Taking out the red paint, Amy starts to paint his red tie that stands out against his dark figure.
"Look at what I found, Amy," her aunt says as she throws down a pile of recently printed paper on her desk. It nearly spills her paint all over. This makes Amy start to pay attention to her, frustration coursing through her.
"What?" Amy almost shouts, just barely an octave higher than usual.
"Look at what I found on the internet, Amy. He's nothing more than a story," her aunt taps on the first page to point out a paragraph.
From the corner of her eye, Amy peers at the paragraph. It speaks of Slenderman being a story that parents used to tell their children at night if they ever misbehaved or that teenagers tell each other after watching a scary movie. She huffs at the article her aunt printed out for her to read.
"Keep reading it," she insists. Amy eventually takes the paper from her and begins to read the rest of the page. It talks of murder and victims never found again and forests and demons and urban legends. "He's a monster."
"Shut up," Amy softly murmurs, tears threatening to spill over.
"Slenderman is the monster in the closet, under your bed. He's imaginary," her aunt continues, not seeing how upset Amy was.
"Shut up," she says it louder, blinking away the unshed tears.
"Oh Amy. How is it that you're almost fifteen and you still have an imaginary friend?" Aunt Sharon sighs, shaking her head at her niece.
"Shut up," she nearly hisses, harshness biting her small shout. Her Aunt Sharon says nothing else and leaves but not before telling her to read the rest of the papers. Right after she exits her room, Amy takes the offending pages and hides them underneath a stack of other papers, not wanting to read the rest of it. Amy spends the rest of her afternoon painting a man who would never return.
"I don't think I'll ever get used to that," Amy admits as the tingling fades away. Every time Slenderman teleports somewhere with her in tow, it was an almost unreal experience. It was like touching the television screen and it shocks you with static but more pleasantly. She runs her tongue across her teeth, not fond of the rattling feeling in her mouth after teleporting.
He doesn't say anything to that. In fact, Amy deduces that he hardly says anything at all unless he really needed to, like that situation back with Prisoner Zero. Yesterday was...beyond bizarre and a little crazy. First off, Slenderman came back. He came back for her. And then there was aliens with eyeball ships and things living in her house and Rory meeting Slenderman and he was talking in her head. Amy nearly thinks that it's all too much. But she rather likes having been in the middle of all that chaos. It was like a giant thrill ride that pumped her full of adrenaline. Now here she was, walking alongside her imaginary friend in a dark and creepy forest.
Amy wants to ask so many questions. She feels like she deserves answers to at least some of them. Where are they going? What is this place? Who are you really?
"He's a monster."
She shakes her aunt's voice out of her head. Instead, she hears Mels' and Rory's voices.
"Why does he have tentacles? Why does he wear a suit? How can he teleport? Is it like Star Trek? Why is he so tall? Where's his face?"
It's better to start with the easier questions. There was less potential to accidentally offend him or something.
"So, what's up...?" Amy inwardly cringes at how casual sounding that was as his face swivels to face her. "With those...tentacles thingies on your back?" She hopelessly describes them, waving her hands in the air.
At her question, the tentacles appear from behind him. They remind Amy of squirming worms nailed down, like out of her science class when they dissected them. She can barely see them in the dark, squinting to get a better look.
"Is that supposed to scare people?" Amy ponders out loud, her head tilting like his while catching glimpses at his writing tentacles. Then she worries if that sounded insulting.
"Yes," his voice echoes in her head.
Other questions that make her flinch flash through her mind. Are you associated with murder? Do children really disappear after meeting you? Are you a story in my head? Why do you live in dark foreboding forests?
Amy decides to ask another safe question. "What's with the suit?"
He simply glances down at said suit and smooths it out, adjusting his tie a little. No answer yet.
"Is it like a disguise?" She swallows before proceeding. "Like a men in black thing?"
"Not...exactly," he says slowly, almost sounding confused by her line of questioning. Close enough, Amy decides.
More questions flood her head. Are you some urban legend come to life? How old are you? What's your story?
"How do you teleport?" Amy nearly mentions the Star Trek bit. That definitely would've confused him. "Is it something you can just...do?"
"Yes..." he responds, still facing her in the dark. Her bright hair stands out amongst the darkness and shines in the moonlight.
"Okay," Amy nods quickly, not liking how monosyllabic he's being right now. He was full of answers earlier. Sort of. But now...it was like he couldn't be bothered to say more than two words to her. Did she do something? With a yawn, Amy stretches her tired limbs in order to bring back life to them.
When he notices her tired state, Slenderman takes her hand and teleports her back to her garden outside her house. "Tomorrow?"
"Tomorrow," he promises and leaves without saying more.
A frown etches on her disappointed face and with that, Amy goes back inside and up to her room where she starts searching for those papers her Aunt Sharon gave her a long time ago. She spends the rest of her night before dawn arrives reading and learning more of her imaginary friend, unaware of what Slenderman was going through at that moment...
